A/N: Helloo~ After two years of abandonment... I seem to have felt to need to take up writing again. Must be hormones or something i dunno? I guess we'll see how this goes... I'm not sure if this'll be a permanent thing or whatever. Anyways, if you guys enjoy this, favourite, follow, review, do nothing, I guess it doesn't really matter, but it'd be nice to have some feedback.
I don't own anything, and just as a warning, there are mentions of panic attacks and other things that I know some people would find uncomfortable so if that's not your thing then you can skip the text in between the asterisks (*). Hopefully, I've put them in the right spots.
He's running, bare feet pounding and skinny arms pumping at his sides. He's trying to figure out the best route to take, but really, he's just dashing around aimlessly. "Are you ready?" The childish voice echoes in his head, along with his laboured breaths and rushing blood. He looks behind him, and sees that the hallway is empty to his relief. He's been wanting to call it quits for a while now, but he's lost his way in this hell hole, and he can't find his way back to Twelve. He's come to realize that Five always brings him to this hallway. The seven-year old figures that she knows this is the one hallway he hasn't committed to his memory. He knows every other hall like the back of his hand - at what interval each stud is placed behind the plaster walls, and where the wires cross in the ceiling. He knows that each shiny, white tile on the ground is six point five inches in length and three point seven inches in width, and that each door frame seven feet and four inches in height and exactly four feet in width. He knows that the colour code for the shade of grey on the walls is #e7e9ec, and that each window is five feet apart, three feet off the ground and has an area from thirty-two inches squared. But this hall is different. In this hall, the tiles on the ground are a dull beige colour of sorts, and have a length of eight point two... No, eight point four... He can't remember. But he does know that the width of the corridor is nine feet and... No, it was ten feet. He really doesn't know. No matter how hard he racks his brain for answers, his thoughts are constantly in a perpetual chaotic state. He's not comfortable in this hallway, and Five knows Nine better than Nine knows the institution, and that scares him.
Turning left, he stops for a bit to catch his breath around the corner. He sits down against the wall with his legs spread out in front of him, arms at his sides and head back. Nine supposes that this is the best way to recover after physical exertion, but Twelve claims that the only way is to lie down flat on your back with your limbs splayed out like a starfish. He remembers the day he first met Twelve 'cause it's the second earliest memory of his childhood he has. *He remembers the confused look on his caretaker's face, but knows that she only means well when she sends him off with the government official. He remembers watching the government official yank a small burlap sack over his face, and the smell of blood and sweat from under his nose. The sudden feeling of panic rising from the pit of his stomach makes him want to scream and cry, but he bites it back and sucks it up. There's a blank after that, and then he remembers waking up in a small, ageing cot. His head is pounding, and the smell of blood and sweat seems to have followed him into the small room with white walls. Later that day, he meets Twelve.* He remembers that the first thing the brunet said to him was "Woah, you've got glasses!" His bright eyes, unwavering smile and welcoming air puts Nine at ease - it's not long before Twelve becomes the only person he really trusts in this horrid place. He's stuck on him like glue after that... Or maybe the other way around. Nine learns to deal with Twelve's clingy-ness and excessive rambling, in exchange for comfort and relief on his worst days. One day, Twelve tells him that he likes Nine's blue.
"Y' know Nine, I really like your shade of blue. It's pale an' icy, but it's kinda comforting too," he says a week after Nine's arrival. They're in the middle of putting together the outer shell of a small stink bomb, something they were taught in a day. Luckily, the supervisor who's currently watching them is nice enough to allow idle chatter.
"Don't be ridiculous Twelve. Blue is a colour, not an object.." Nine replies, his eyes glued to his explosive.
"Oh, did I tell you? I have syn-synaesthesia. Coma-thesia... I mean Chromethesia... to be exact." He struggles with these two words because they're unfamiliar on a five year old's lips. "It means that I can see colours when I hear sounds. Your voice is like the colour of that energy drink we got when we almost fell asleep while building stuff. I really like that colour." he says as he turns his screwdriver with pale hands.
"Oh," is Nine's only reply.
Nine is granted a couple precious seconds of rest while he hides from Five. *He can't stop his hands from shaking, nor the ragged panting from running so much. Even so, he's learned to deal with these hindrances after years of the same routine. He's also sweating and a little lightheaded, but its nothing that he can't ignore.
"Number nine now entering the lab, number nine. Proceed with caution." The security guard shoves eight-year old Nineout of the line and towards the group of adults with white lab coats. *They lift him onto a metal table and strap down his arms and legs. He's scared beyond his wits, and his hands are shaking so much that the doctors have to hold them so they can tie them properly. They probably would've any ways, after seeing Two attempt an escape. They put a large bowl-shaped helmet on his head, and all of the sudden, he remembers the smell of sweat and blood. They had wiped his memory once they found out he was having nightmares, but he finds that he still dreams about past events every once in a while. The shaking in his hands get worse and they voices of the doctors are drowned out by the sound of his blood pounding in his ears.
"No! Stop!" he screams for them to go away, but they're only getting closer when they try to calm him down. He's struggling now with tears streaming down his face. Every time he tries to wrench himself out of the leather straps, he just ends up cutting his wrists and ankles. He hears himself scream, not that he means to. Or maybe that wasn't him - he can't be sure, since he's lost control of his body a while a ago. He doesn't regain feeling in his fingers until he hears the contraption on his head whir to life. He blanks out after that because the pain is so bad that he can practically see the back of his skull.* He's out cold after that experience, if memory serves, but he does find out that he's a whole lot smarter when he opens his eyes. Suddenly, he can understand things like javascript, and why the chemical reaction between sodium and fluorine is so strong. Except he seems to have like it better when still needed to draw the little tick when he carried over the one while doing double-digit multiplication, or when he didn't know the meaning of the word sciamachy. He feels that knowing these things puts him in a position where he's obligated to eventually have all this crap forced into his brain, and that scares him.
His heartbeat is finally calming down when the voice makes its way into his brain again, only this time it's real. The blood in his veins freeze and the shaking gets worse. His blood is pumping faster and louder, and he knows that it won't be long before Five finds him - she's always been the best at Hide and Seek. Scrambling to his feet, Nine cautiously peers around the corner. When he sees the snowy white hair bouncing with every step, he immediately draws away. Her eyes glint sadistically under her bangs and her signature smile dangles from her ears. He shudders as he draws away from the corner, for he knows that she's already seen him. He can hear, see, feel her getting closer with each step. Her pace isn't half of what Nine's was just a minute earlier, but every forward step she takes feels like a leap to him. Without thinking, Nine takes off again - he's given up on trying to running to safety, so he runs from fear instead.
"Hey Nine," Nine is cleaning his glasses with the hem of his shirt when he hears his name being called. He puts them back on and adjusts them so they fit nicely on the bridge of his nose. Turning around, he sees Five standing with her hands clasped behind her back. It's only been a couple days since their first jamming (that's what Nine calls them - when they make him wear the bowl-like helmet and force years worth of information into his brain in seconds), and it's only One, Three, Five, Eight, Nine and Twelve left, though Three and Twelve did not cope well with the experiment. Since Nine's only friend is still resting elsewhere, he is alone again today and has been for what feels like forever. He's been absolutely silent during their free-time these days.
"What is it Five?" Nine cannot think of a good enough reason as to why Five would want to talk to him, but he figures that it's not a big deal. Five's hair seems to be growing more spontaneously by the day, Nine observes. The white strands rest at the top of her head in the shape of an afro, and Nine wonders how her hair has even come to grow in that fashion.
"Let's play a game," she proposes.
"A game." Nine repeats.
"Yes Nine, a game. You'll hide and I'll try to find you." she replies. Nine knows that Five is really smart. She can finish her programming assignments in less than half an hour, and understand complicated math questions that Nine has never even seen before.
"I'd rather not," Nine declines immediately. He doesn't like the idea of playing a game of such sorts with Five because if you ask him, he thinks that she's a little peculiar.
"C'mon, it'll be fun! I'll even go easy on you!" she teases him and pokes him in the arm a couple times.
"Okay, okay, but only once. I don't think we should be leaving the room," he finally agrees while shying away from her touch. He's then led outside by the wrist by the little girl, who has a finger up to her mouth.
When they sneak safely into another hall, Five's innocent smile suddenly changes into that of a sadist's smile. She's glaring up at him through her fluffy, white bangs and the corners of her mouth stretch up to her earlobes. Shivers run up and down Nine's spine, and he begins to back away in fear. She opens her mouth the slightest bit, and only one word escapes her lips in her ecstatic state.
"Run."
*Nine doesn't hesitate when he hears the three letters glide off her tongue. He's sprinting in less than a second, and suddenly feels like he's never been happier to be better built for athletics than she is. He doesn't have time to calculate the best possible route back to their room since Five is right on his tail. Instead, he opts for just running, because he knows that that's the one thing he can do better than her. Except taking five strides feels more like fifty, and the familiar anxiety in his chest is back. He feels like there is something pressing against his lungs and obstructing his airways, but that's the least of his worries at the moment. He doesn't stop running until one of the staff members at the institution finds him, and makes sure he's punished for leaving without permission. When he's thrown back into their play room, he finds Five playing with some wooden building blocks by the window. She looks up from her little tower upon his entrance, as do the others in the room. Nine turns away from the attention he's drawing, and scans the room for Twelve, only to remember that he's not there. Five gives him a recognizable smile when he turns his head in her direction, and he's suddenly overrun with fear.*
He turns right this time, and whips his head around to look behind him. Five is also running now, and her eyes are wild with excitement as the distance between them closes.
"Are you ready?" he hears Five's soft voice.
Nine turns back to face the front, and his eyes widen when he sees a wall at the end of the hall.
"Are you ready?"
It's the end of the round.
"Are you ready?"
He's got nowhere to run and nowhere to hide, and that gives Five all the more reason to tag him.
"Are you ready?"
He turns around, facing Five as she approaches, her song coming to an end. Her bangs cover her eyes, but her smile doesn't falter as she reaches out her pale hand. Nine steps backwards to shy away from her touch, but it's too late. Five's head suddenly snaps up to look him in the eyes. Her eyes are even wilder with excitement and her smile gets even bigger. Her fingers are less than a foot away and Nine's heart thumps as her fingers-
He shoots up from the couch with a gasp. He's sweating and shaking and panting and he's tired of playing this game. Twelve is sleeping up in the loft where they usually work, and Lisa is resting in the spare room across the hall - neither seems to have noticed him. It's all in your head, he tells himself as he swallows thickly. Five is gone. He grabs his glasses from the table and looks over to the clock on the wall to his right. It's four in the morning, and he's only gotten two hours of sleep. In any case, he's wide awake now and knows that there's no point in trying to get more rest. The living room is still dark, still spotless, and still Five-free. Sighing, he blows on his shaky hands and quietly makes his way to the kitchen for a glass of ice water. It's gone in less than a minute and he leaves the empty cup in the sink. He walks into the room where Twelve is sleeping, where the computers and cellphones are in the same position as he had left them the night before.
He likes being awake before the sun is up, because it makes him feel like he can do anything. He feels like he can reach the stars, or leap to the next apartment building in one go. Like he can become the president or fly with airplanes, except he can't. Not anymore. That dream is long gone, and is merely an idle thought now. Somewhere in his mind, he thinks that at some point he might've liked to do all four, but he's smarter than that. For now, he just likes to watch the sun rise.
He looks down at the city, and sees that even at four in the morning Tokyo is bustling about. He thinks that Tokyo's sky is different from Tokyo's ground. The ground is polluted with cars and people and everything else that irks Nine, but they sky, the sky is where everything is free. There are no rules or boundaries or people, and Nine often wishes that he wasn't bound to the ground.
"Hey, Nine?" Twelve turns his head away from the window to look at his roommate. A small, paperback book has the boy occupied. The fiction novel is something he pick-pocketed off of the security guard outside the dorms when he "bumped into him." Ten years old and six jammings later, Nine's learned things that not even the helmet could teach him. He's picked up on habits, developed skills, and learned how to take the smart way out of most situations - "most," because his game with Five still has not come to an end. It's just the three of them left now; the others were deemed "useless" after the fourth jamming, and were disposed of without a second thought.
"Hm?" he doesn't look up, but he knows that Twelve is aware of his attention.
"What's your opinion on flying?" he asks. He's sitting on the windowsill, with his legs drawn up against his chest and his small hands on his knees.
The question is so absurd to Nine at first that he actually stops reading and looks at Twelve in the eye. The brunet seems to be completely serious about the odd question and patiently waits for an answer. The sun outside is setting and the sky is orange, casting a shadow over Twelve's slight frame.
After a couple seconds of thoughtful contemplation, Nine responds. "If I could fly, I wouldn't be stuck in here reading this stupid book,"
He stays by the window since he sees no reason to do anything productive. It's calming, the way it slowly moves from behind the mountains and illuminates the city. With his restless mind, he's able to forget a lot of things when he watches the sunrise. Though, it seems that his thoughts aren't only kept to himself, since it's not long before his presence wakes Twelve. He asks the same questions, and gives him the same advice with the same tone and same subtle hint of concern. Maybe it's about time you stopped being afraid of that dream. Nine doesn't reply, but inside, he desperately wishes for his roommate's words to become a reality, because later that day, their game of hide and seek has come to another stopping point.
I found you. ^.^
He's running again, only this time he's with Twelve and Five. The spring air feels amazing on his skin, and he loves the feeling of wind rushing by his ears and through your hair, but that's the last thing on his mind right now. The distance between the fence and the youths are getting shorter, but so are the security guards and the heat of the fire. A rush of adrenaline courses through him as he leaps onto the fence after Twelve, whom he sees to his right.
London bridge is falling down, falling down, falling down.
Whipping his head around, he sees Five on all fours, her small figure nearly concealed by the tall grass. He looks past her body, and sees that the men in black suits are catching up.
London bridge is falling down.
She's not gonna make it!
My fair lady.
Nine calls her name and and screams to hurry up, but his efforts are wasted. Five stands up on her own, and Nine's eyes widen as he sees an all too familiar smile. The fire is approaching, and it won't be long until they're caught in the fray. He gives her one last holler, but it's too late. The blaze of the fire has reached them, and Five is engulfed in flames. She gives them one last look, but all Nine sees is the smile that he's constantly running away from. Suddenly, the shaking is back and his ears start ringing. He hears Twelve calling to him, but his limbs are frozen, his blood is pounding in his ears and he feels like he can't breathe. He sees his vision go blurry, and -
He's awake, with the familiar sound of his heart beating wildly and his ragged panting. His hands are shaking again, but none of these are noticeable with the burns on his back he had gotten the day before. He sits up and finds himself in the loft, his feet where his head should've been. He's also pretty sure his bed head is legendary. It's just another day, but the same nightmare.
Nine's eyes snap open to see Twelve's concerned face looking down at him. The brunet blinks a couple times, and Nine sits up to calm himself down. He's barely gotten any sleep these past few nights, and the games with Five aren't helping either. He wakes up at ungodly hours, covered in a thin layer of sweat, hands shaking and sweet oxygen filling his lungs. This time is no different.
"Did you have a nightmare?" Twelve asks with concern is his voice.
Nine swallows thickly as he wipes away the sweat with the back of his hand. "It's nothing," he replies passively. He can't tell Twelve about his games with Five because he's scared that she'll find out, so he keeps it a secret and hopes that Twelve won't pry into his business.
*When Twelve finally lets him go and shuffles back to his own bed, Nine lies down, but doesn't sleep a wink. Every time he closes his eyes, he sees Five's sadistic smile and hears that stupid, stupid London Bridge song, and is suddenly forced to open his eyes again lest he start screaming and crying. The only thing he can do is lie under his thin, white sheets, and hope that Five isn't standing right behind him. Five's taken a lot of things away from him since they started playing their games. After their first jamming, Twelve has become a "guard" of sorts to boy. Nine thinks that if Twelve leaves again, he will surely stop trying to run. He's even lost a lot of sleep. Nine knows that Twelve has noticed the dark bags under his eyes, but he acts like he doesn't, and says that he just wasn't sleepy when the brunet asks about them. It's been hard these past few days, and he's lost much more than he can imagine. Even so, he can't bring himself to tell Twelve.*
Fear has turned him into an insomniac.
He doesn't bother putting on his glasses as he leaves the loft and finds Twelve sitting near the bottom of the stairs, silently staring out the window (Lisa is nowhere to be found in the room). He tells Nine to get some more rest, but he can't with all that's in his head at the moment. He's still shaky from the dream and feels so nauseous that he thinks he's going to throw up. He's scared, to be quite frank. He didn't want to have to relive his days from the institution, and Five's text from yesterday turned his nightmares into a reality. He scared because even after all these years, they're still in the same routine. They're playing the same game, with the same rules, and the same outcomes.
Five's found him, and he's scared, because he's not ready.
A/N: I have a head cannon that Nine is actually very dependent on Twelve and Twelve is the mother hen in their relationship. I tried experimenting with something a little darker themed and personal for a series about terrorism, but I think it turned out okay? If you've read this far, thank you for sticking it out all the way, and hopefully I'll be writing more in the future!